The Exam
by sapereaude13
Summary: Seifer struggles with the SeeD exam as he always does. Completed for the Chocobo Madness challenge on the WTFF8 LJ community. Rated M for strong language. Seifer is a bad boy.


He hadn't expected to spend the entire exam on his hands and knees. Fucking Leonhart, this was his fault.

"Almasy, are you taking this exam or napping?" Trepe snapped at him, clicking her stupid pencil on her stupid clipboard.

Rising to his feet, he offered her a smile and a rude gesture. "You call this a SeeD exam? This is bullshit."

Quistis rolled her eyes and made a mark on the clipboard. "Wow. I didn't think anyone could get a negative Attitude score within the first hour, but life is full of surprises, Almasy."

He sighed and watched the other pathetic excuses for SeeD candidates scurrying to and fro, their eagerness to please the exam proctors making his skin crawl. Where was the excitement in this? The exam for this semester wasn't a mission to free a besieged nation or assassinate terrorists or even escort a VIP as a personal bodyguard.

No. They were in fucking _Winhill_ of all places. And why? To catch a chocobo. A fucking chocobo. The damned bird was apparently stealing from the townsfolk, and the exam candidates were to find it in the fields just outside of town. 

Leonhart had said that it was "just as important and vital an undertaking as any SeeD mission."

Seifer felt that it was a waste of his time. If this was where SeeD was headed now that the sorceress was defeated, he wondered again why he was even trying for it.

Oh yeah. Money. That very very important thing. Getting to kick ass for a living beat out any other customer service job in Balamb or Timber. Two months as a grocery store stock boy, three days as a fisherman's assistant and then that unmentionable two and half hours as a late night bus driver in Deling City had assured Seifer that mercenary was really the only professional career choice logical for a man like him.

But hunting for a bird was not what he'd expected. He'd failed the SeeD exam half a dozen times in half a dozen years, but never before had the exam been this idiotic. 

"Instructor Trepe, Instructor Trepe!" some whiny pre-pubescent brat screamed. "He's heading your way!"

Seifer spied the slightest quirk in Trepe's ice queen lips. "That would be your cue, Almasy." She kept her pencil poised over the exam forms. "I can't wait to determine your Conduct mark."

"Bitch," he whispered under his breath, readying his gunblade.

"Almasy!" Trepe cried. "You're not going to kill it, are you?"

He turned around. "What the fuck am I supposed to do?"

"Catch it!" she demanded. "You are not allowed to fillet the damn thing."

Seifer could easily see himself filleting Trepe first, then the other assholes running around for the exam. But he supposed that he'd be living in a box, if not a prison after a move like that. Leonhart would piss himself in excitement at that.

He tossed his gunblade to the ground with one last sneer in Trepe's direction. "Fine. I'll catch the fucking chocobo."

The sound of the other students' squealing alerted him that it was just about time. He could see the grass rustling in the distance. Taking a deep breath and stretching a bit, Seifer took off in a run and leapt into the air gracefully.

He landed hard in a flower bed, scattering dirt and daisies, but the terrified "WARK!" he heard confirmed that he'd caught the little bastard. And it was a little one – more a chick than a parent. Rinoa's dog could have probably eaten it.

"I got you, you little fucker!"

"Points for Spirit," Quistis mumbled, and he hadn't even heard her approach.

Her sudden arrival distracted him long enough for the damn bird to peck his hand hard.

"Son of a…fuck!" he screamed, rolling over to let the bird free. The little asshole! His hand was bleeding and hurt like a bitch.

Quistis knelt down and sighed. "You're never going to pass this exam," she muttered, examining his wound. She cast a Cure spell on him while he growled under his breath. The excited, high pitched squeal he heard a moment later indicated that one of the other candidates had been more successful. "What is Squall going to have to do? Hold the next SeeD exam at a nursing home?"

He glared at her. "Fuck off."

Seifer thought he saw her grin as she rose to her feet. Quistis departed with her clipboard. Another exam, another failure. Fucking chocobos.


End file.
